> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.secapi.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# SEC API vs sec-api.io

> Feature-by-feature comparison of SEC API and sec-api.io — speed, pricing, endpoints, and agent support

A direct comparison of the two leading SEC data APIs for developers and AI agents.

## Speed

Two independent benchmark runs, each with its own SEC API baseline measured at the same time as the competitor. SEC API p50 has improved between runs (production performance is not static) — each table's speedup uses the SEC API value measured alongside that competitor, not across runs.

**vs sec-api.io** (benchmark captured 2026-03-18)

| Operation          | SEC API p50 | sec-api.io p50 | Winner         |
| ------------------ | ----------- | -------------- | -------------- |
| Entity resolution  | **62ms**    | 231ms          | SEC API (3.7x) |
| Filing search      | **64ms**    | 281ms          | SEC API (4.4x) |
| Section extraction | **64ms**    | 348ms          | SEC API (5.4x) |
| XBRL-to-JSON       | **61ms**    | 392ms          | SEC API (6.4x) |

**vs edgartools** (benchmark captured 2026-04-23, preliminary, subprocess-isolated cold fetches)

| Operation          | SEC API p50 | edgartools p50 | Winner          |
| ------------------ | ----------- | -------------- | --------------- |
| Entity resolution  | **34ms**    | 471ms          | SEC API (13.9x) |
| Filing search      | **38ms**    | 688ms          | SEC API (18.1x) |
| Section extraction | **34ms**    | 3,081ms        | SEC API (90.6x) |
| XBRL-to-JSON       | **34ms**    | 1,508ms        | SEC API (44.3x) |

<Tip>
  edgartools numbers are preliminary pending final verification. See [benchmark-results](/benchmark-results) and [compare-edgartools](/compare-edgartools) for the full comparison and methodology.
</Tip>

## Pricing

| Tier              | SEC API              | sec-api.io           | edgartools                  |
| ----------------- | -------------------- | -------------------- | --------------------------- |
| **Starter grant** | 150 calls (one-time) | 100 calls (lifetime) | Unlimited (MIT, truly free) |
| **Pay-as-you-go** | From \$0.01/call     | Not offered          | N/A                         |
| **Personal**      | \$55/month           | \$49/month           | \$0                         |
| **Business/Team** | \$239/month          | \$199/month          | \$0                         |
| **Enterprise**    | Custom               | Custom               | None (community-supported)  |

**Key differences:**

* **SEC API vs sec-api.io:** SEC API offers true pay-as-you-go with no monthly minimum. An agent making 200 queries/month pays $4 with SEC API vs $49 minimum with sec-api.io.
* **vs edgartools:** edgartools is genuinely free (MIT Python library, calls SEC directly). The tradeoff is client-side parsing, no SLA, no commercial support, Python-only, and a latency/payload profile that's 13.9-90.6× and 600-1,000× higher than SEC API on the operations above. See [compare-edgartools](/compare-edgartools) for when each is the right choice.

## Features

| Feature                  | SEC API                                    | sec-api.io                  |
| ------------------------ | ------------------------------------------ | --------------------------- |
| **Endpoints**            | 217+                                       | \~35                        |
| **Filing coverage**      | 1993–present (18.5M+ manifests)            | 1993–present (20M+ claimed) |
| **Full-text search**     | Yes                                        | Yes                         |
| **Semantic search**      | Yes (hybrid vector + keyword)              | No                          |
| **Hybrid search (RRF)**  | Yes                                        | No                          |
| **Intelligence bundles** | Yes (company, security, earnings)          | No                          |
| **Filing diff**          | Yes (amendment tracking)                   | No                          |
| **Saved monitors**       | Yes (webhook alerts)                       | No                          |
| **Workflow templates**   | Yes (3 built-in)                           | No                          |
| **MCP integration**      | Yes (native)                               | No                          |
| **CLI**                  | Yes (`secapi` on npm)                      | No                          |
| **SDKs**                 | 4 (JS, Python, Go, Rust)                   | 2 (Python, Node.js)         |
| **Homebrew**             | Yes                                        | No                          |
| **Skills**               | 8 canonical skills                         | No                          |
| **Agent bootstrap**      | Yes (ephemeral credentials)                | No                          |
| **Budget controls**      | Yes (threshold alerts)                     | No                          |
| **Webhooks**             | Yes (signed, replay)                       | No                          |
| **Event streams**        | Yes (cursor-based)                         | No                          |
| **Data provenance**      | Yes (trace on every object)                | No                          |
| **Filing export**        | 6 formats (JSON, MD, CSV, XLSX, DOCX, PDF) | PDF only                    |

## Endpoint Coverage

| Category                    | SEC API                                                        | sec-api.io                        |
| --------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------- |
| Filing search               | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| Full-text search            | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| Section extraction          | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| XBRL/statements             | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| Entity mapping              | Yes (+ FIGI, ISIN)                                             | Yes                               |
| Insider trading             | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| 13F holdings                | Yes (+ comparison)                                             | Yes                               |
| Executive comp              | Yes (+ comparison)                                             | Yes                               |
| Enforcement                 | Yes (5,993+ records)                                           | Yes                               |
| Board composition           | Yes                                                            | Yes (directors)                   |
| Subsidiaries                | Yes (Exhibit 21)                                               | Yes                               |
| Audit fees                  | Yes                                                            | No                                |
| Form 144                    | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| Form D (structured)         | Yes (XML extraction)                                           | Yes                               |
| Form C                      | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| Reg A (Form 1-A)            | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| N-PORT                      | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| N-CEN                       | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| N-PX                        | Yes                                                            | Yes                               |
| Form ADV                    | Yes (+ schedule/AUM filters)                                   | Yes                               |
| **8-K 5.07 voting results** | **Yes (structured proposals, vote counts, approval outcomes)** | **No (open bug since July 2025)** |
| EDGAR index                 | Yes (3 endpoints)                                              | Yes                               |
| Bulk download               | Yes (summary + quarter)                                        | Yes (file mirror)                 |
| Real-time streaming         | Yes (WebSocket + webhooks)                                     | Yes (WebSocket only)              |
| **Semantic search**         | **Yes**                                                        | **No**                            |
| **Intelligence bundles**    | **Yes**                                                        | **No**                            |
| **Filing diff**             | **Yes**                                                        | **No**                            |
| **Monitors**                | **Yes**                                                        | **No**                            |
| **Factor analysis**         | **Yes (broad catalog with narrower launch surface)**           | **No**                            |
| **Macro data**              | **Yes (12 countries)**                                         | **No**                            |
| **Portfolio analytics**     | **Yes**                                                        | **No**                            |

## Developer Experience

| Feature            | SEC API                                        | sec-api.io                 |
| ------------------ | ---------------------------------------------- | -------------------------- |
| Onboarding time    | \< 2 minutes                                   | \~5 minutes                |
| API key creation   | Explicit dashboard/API creation, revealed once | Manual                     |
| Starter grant      | 150 one-time, no card                          | 100 lifetime starter calls |
| Documentation      | 205 pages                                      | \~40 pages                 |
| Tutorials          | 8 (Python + JS)                                | 27 (Python only)           |
| OpenAPI spec       | Yes (generated from Zod)                       | No                         |
| Changelog          | Yes                                            | No                         |
| Status page        | Yes                                            | No                         |
| Error codes        | Structured with requestId                      | Basic                      |
| Rate limit headers | Yes (remaining, limit)                         | No                         |
| Budget headers     | Yes (usage %, threshold)                       | No                         |

## Migration

Already using sec-api.io? Our [migration guide](https://docs.secapi.ai/migrate-from-sec-api) maps every sec-api.io endpoint to its SEC API equivalent.

```bash theme={null}
# sec-api.io                          →  SEC API
# /mapping/ticker/AAPL                →  /v1/entities/resolve?ticker=AAPL
# POST / (filing search)              →  /v1/filings?ticker=AAPL&form=10-K
# /extractor?url=...&item=1A          →  /v1/filings/latest/sections/item_1a
# /xbrl-to-json?accession=...         →  /v1/statements/all?ticker=AAPL
```

## Try SEC API

```bash theme={null}
export SECAPI_API_KEY="<your-api-key>"

curl "https://api.secapi.ai/v1/entities/resolve?ticker=AAPL" \
  -H "x-api-key: $SECAPI_API_KEY"
```

[Create an account](https://secapi.ai/signup) to get an API key.